Thursday, June 14, 2012

Washington, D.C./Rio de Janeiro -- Thursday, June 14, 2012 -- With hunger and malnutrition at the top of the world's agenda, humanitarian agency Church World Service is participating in high level summits in Brazil and in Washington, D.C. with an eye toward advocating on all available fronts for public policy that helps to reduce food and nutrition insecurity for the planet’s most vulnerable people.

As world leaders meet in Brazil for talks on sustainable development and poverty eradication, much of the conversation will center on the environment. CWS, represented at the gathering by Senior Advisor for Global Advocacy David Weaver, has joined its partner ACT Alliance in a call to decision makers to take advantage of the opportunity in Rio, June 20-22, to reduce poverty, promote clean energy, protect the environment and advance social justice by making "bold and meaningful decisions that the world – and particularly its poorest citizens – urgently needs."

"There is no question that environmental issues, such as climate change, already are having a disastrous impact on food production and food security for people in drought- and flood-prone regions," said CWS's Weaver. The humanitarian agency's food security programs focus not just on ending hunger, but also on providing children with nutrition-rich diets to prevent life-long mental and physical deficiencies that can result from nutritionally inadequate diets.

The Brazil Rio+20 meetings follow the June 14-15 high level Child Survival: Call to Action summit in Washington, D.C., a gathering of leaders from the private sector, governmental bodies, civil society and the faith community being convened by the U.S., Ethiopia and India, in collaboration with UNICEF.

Church World Service Executive Director and CEO John L. McCullough, who is participating in the June 13-14 child survival meetings in Washington, made the point in his blog for the Huffington Post that providing nutritional assistance to young children, impoverished people and disaster survivors not only is an integral part of creating lasting food security for a sustainable future, but an act of faith.

"It is simply wrong for children to be allowed to die of malnutrition and we will advocate and act in all the forums available to us, from Brazil to Washington, DC to encourage public policy that protects people, especially children, the most vulnerable of all, from hunger and malnutrition." says McCullough. "At Rio+20, we will be holding the vision of healthy children before us, as the world’s leaders look at more sustainable and climate-resilient ways to grow, share and consume our food.”